


Futures Lost

by Iverna



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-24
Updated: 2014-09-24
Packaged: 2018-02-18 14:04:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2351066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iverna/pseuds/Iverna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>AU; when Emma and Hook travelled back in time, they changed things so the curse never happened. In this alternate timeline, they meet one day when Princess Emma wanders into a tavern looking for passage home, and meets a middle-aged pirate captain who reluctantly agrees to take her aboard. Unfortunately, they run afoul of the Dark One, who is out for vengeance after his plans for finding his son were foiled.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Futures Lost

Emma didn’t need magic to know that he was dying. She reached for it anyway, tried to use the healing techniques that Regina had taught her, but this was magical poison, made by the Dark One. Intended for her. “Captain...”

“Shh, lass, it’s all right.” Hook levered himself up until he was half-sitting, half-slouching against the wall, his good hand pressed against the wound in his side. Beneath the salt-and-pepper stubble on his cheeks, his skin was pale, the lines in his face deeper than ever. “You’re safe.”

“Why?” she demanded, because it still made no sense. She had known him for less than a week. He was a pirate. He had no business giving his life for her. “Why did you do it?”

Hook hesitated, then he closed his eyes. “You heard him. Rumplestiltskin. What he said about you. About us.”

“You believe him?” If she was honest, Emma was still reeling from the Dark One’s words. Travelling back from the future. A curse. She: an orphan, a mother, a saviour. And all of it would have come to pass if two strangers hadn’t inadvertently helped persuade Regina to abandon her quest for vengeance.

Two strangers. Two lovers. A pirate and a princess.

It sounded completely crazy. The man before her looked older than her father, and right up until he’d pushed her out of the way of that poisoned blade, she’d had no idea that he was even capable of caring about anyone other than himself.

“You’re the one who can detect lies, Swan,” Hook said, and she almost smiled to hear him call her by the ridiculous alias she’d picked. “You tell me.”

“It’s crazy.”

“Aye, that it is.” He sighed, a pained sound, and opened his eyes again. A week ago, she’d thought them cold and hard, chips of ice in a face marked by a lifetime of anger and hatred and dreams of vengeance. Now, she could see past it to the grief and pain and despair inside him, and her heart was breaking. “But whatever games he might be playing, we do have a connection, you and I. I felt it the moment I saw you in that tavern. You looked so damn familiar...”

He tried a smile; it didn't quite take, looked out of place on his hardened features, but she thought that she could see the shadow of it. “I was quite dashing back then, you know. Devilishly handsome, you might s—ahh.” His lips pressed together, his eyes squeezing shut again.

Tears stung her eyes. “Hook,” she said, and reached out to cover his hand with hers.

The jolt that went through her was magical rather than physical, but she still felt it in every fibre of her being. And she _knew_.

It wasn’t memory, not exactly, because she knew that none of it had ever happened. But it was real, all the same. A different future.

She’d had – would have had, should have had – a son. A boy whose unwavering belief had brought her home, a boy whom she’d lost without ever really having him.

And Hook...

He’d been younger, less angry. He’d found his way back to himself, put his past behind him, turned his life around.

“I’m sorry,” she said, hearing her voice crack.

For a moment, the pirate said nothing, just lay there, his face scrunched up with the effort of keeping the pain at bay.

“Emma,” he whispered, and when he opened his eyes again he was looking at her differently. He knew, too. “Don’t be sorry, love. You got to stay with your parents, your family. You’re not a lost girl.”

She _felt_ lost. More than that: she felt bereft. Her past had been changed, but the price of that was her future. Her son. And probably more besides that she would never even know about.

The worst part of it was that she still had it better than Hook.

“It’s not fair,” she heard herself say. “There has to be a way to go back. I’ll find Rumplestiltskin.” And he was going to pay, she promised herself. At the very least, he’d pay, for telling them this, for making them _know_.

“No.” Hook’s voice was quieter now, his breath hitching as he spoke. “No vengeance. Promise me that. Take it from me, Swan, vengeance will ruin your life. And you must live. Live for both of us.”

The tears were falling now, spilling from her eyes and dripping onto his shirt. She just shook her head, as if the gesture could ward off the reality before her.

“Emma,” he said, insistent. “Promise me. You’re a tough lass. You can do this.”

She sniffed, wiped at her eyes to no real avail, and nodded. “I promise. But I—this is all wrong. There has to be a way to fix this. We can figure it out, we can—”

“Shh,” he cut her off, his voice weaker than before. “Shh. Emma. Just tell me one thing.”

His eyes were losing focus, so she squeezed his hand harder and leaned closer. “Yeah. Sure. Anything.” He didn’t respond. “Hook? What is it?”

With an effort, it seemed, he focused and saw her again. “Did you... do you think you could have loved me?”

It was all wrong. He was a pirate, he was eaten up by anger and vengeance, he looked older than her father, it was the wrong place and the wrong time, and yet Emma couldn’t stop thinking _what if_. Knowing _what if_.

“Yes.” She tried to smile past her tears, knowing that her lips were wobbling and her eyes were puffy, but he had, would have, treasured her smiles and it was the best she could do now. “Yes, I would have loved you.”

He smiled back, and for the first time since she’d known him, it reached his eyes. For the first time, she could see a glimpse of the man he’d been, could have been, in his face. “Thank you.”

The sight left his eyes then, and Emma held onto his hands and barely felt the tears run down her face. She leaned forward and shut his eyes, kissed his forehead, brushed the hair back from his face, and all the while her heart was breaking into pieces at how familiar it felt to touch him.

Some people, her mother always said, spent their whole lives being haunted by _what if_. Emma would spend her whole life knowing the answer, and it would haunt her all the more.

The son she would never have. The man she would never love. The home she would never find. She’d lost them, lost it all, without ever having any of it to begin with. She didn’t even have memories, only the bitter knowledge of what could have been. Would have been.

She let her head fall onto Hook's still form and buried her face in his vest, and she wept.


End file.
